By Dennis Hartley

So I was fast-forwarding  past the vapid, over-choreographed, auto-tuned corporate muzak on the AMAs tonight (thank the gods for DVRs), hoping against hope I’d stumble across something that resembled an organic, analog performance…when this happened:

No, you heard it right: “No Trump! No KKK! No Fascist USA!”

Oh, yeah. Kick out the jams, motherfuckers.

Can’t wait to see the president-elect’s 3am tweets about that one…

By Dennis Hartley

From The Los Angeles Times:

Donald Trump has “hijacked” the Republican Party and comes in as possibly the “worst” idea ever for America, the lead singer of the band U2 said.

“America is the best idea the world ever came up with,” Irish singer-songwriter Bono told “CBS This Morning” in an interview that aired Tuesday. “But Donald Trump is potentially the worst idea that ever happened to America – potentially.”

Bono, whose real name is Paul David Hewson, argued that the Republican presidential nominee threatens America’s underlying values of justice and equality for all.

“He’s hijacked the party. I think he’s trying to hijack the idea of America,” he said. And I think it’s bigger than all of us. I think it’s …really dangerous.”

BOOM! Couldn’t have summarized it better myself.

I can’t wait to see Trump’s flurry of after-midnight tweets, firing back:

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

“Pudgy Bono” said bad things about me. Ivanka tells me he’s this big deal rock singer. I bet I can do what he does so much better. Believe me.

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

I hear Pudgy Bono does lots of work for charities. I don’t know, but that’s what people say. Maybe someone should investigate these “charities”.

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

So I hear Pudgy Bono has been performing concerts in America. He’s not even a citizen. Does he have a work visa? I don’t know. We should check.

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

Have you seen Pudgy Bono’s tiny little hands? And he’s so short. I think he actually might be a leprechaun. I’m not sure. We’re looking into that.

Stay tuned…

By Dennis Hartley

46 years ago today, the 3-day 1970 Atlanta International Pop Festival opened.  Attendees were estimated to be around 200,000.

Historically overshadowed by Woodstock (held 11 months earlier), it still boasted an equally impressive roster of performers. Granted, a number of Woodstock luminaries were there (Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Winter,  Ten Years After, John Sebastian, Richie Havens, Mountain et.al.), but there were top acts exclusive to the Atlanta Festival like The Allman Brothers, B.B. King, The Chambers Brothers, Procol Harum, Grand Funk Railroad, Spirit, Rare Earth, Mott the Hoople, and It’s A Beautiful Day (just to name a few).

The cost of a ticket?  $14.  I’ll spell that out, so you don’t think it’s a typo: fourteen dollars. Yes, I know, inflation, yadda yadda…but still (a front row seat at this fall’s Desert Trip will only set you back $9,400).

But I digress. Back to Atlanta, 1970.  At midnight on July 4th, Jimi Hendrix performed to the biggest domestic audience of his career (sadly, just over two months later, he was gone forever). He played a rousing set, which is documented in the excellent 2015 Showtime production, Jimi Hendrix: Electric Church (currently available  on Showtime’s In-Demand feature, if you haven’t caught it yet). Hendrix included his idiosyncratic “Star Spangled Banner” salute (how could he not do it on the Fourth?), with fireworks. Pretty awesome stuff.

Unfortunately, despite the “right of the people peaceably to assemble”  (not to mention that whole freedom of expression thing) someone didn’t find Jimi’s paean so awesome (there’s one in every crowd). The “someone”?  Governor Lester Maddox. Two days after the festival, he announced he was going to push for legislation to ban any future such DFH events in his state.  Because you know…freedom.

Oh, Georgia. Happy holiday weekend, everyone!

By Dennis Hartley

Oh, Donnie. Brian May is less than pleased with Trump co-opting Queen’s “We Are the Champions” as his grand entrance theme:

[From Rolling Stone]

“I’ve had an avalanche of complaints – some of which you can see in our ‘Letters’ page – about Donald Trump using our ‘We Are The Champions’ track as his ‘theme’ song on USA TV,” May wrote on his website. “This is not an official Queen statement, but I can confirm that permission to use the track was neither sought nor given. We are taking advice on what steps we can take to ensure this use does not continue. Regardless of our views on Mr. Trump’s platform, it has always been against our policy to allow Queen music to be used as a political campaigning tool.”

[…]

May isn’t the first musician to deny Trump access to their catalogs. In September, after the politician used R.E.M.’s hit “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” at a rally, singer Michael Stipe angrily responded, “Go fuck yourselves, the lot of you – you sad, attention-grabbing, power-hungry little men … Do not use our music or my voice for your moronic charade of a campaign.”

Sad! In the interest of mediation, may I suggest the following (and much more apropos) selection for Mr. Trump’s intros going forward?